A decade ago, Thomas Princen published a book called The logic of sufficiency*, which presents and analyses the features of the ecological rationale and its consequences. The explanation is based on a very detailed economic and management analysis of three case studies. We will summarise one of these; sustainable lobster fishing off the islands of Monhegan (Maine) by a small community.

From these three empirical analyses of long-term stewardship, Thomas Princen infers some general and normative principles of a Homo ecologicus rationale characterised by self-restraint, which runs counter to the traditional rationale of Homo economicus, where self-interest is seen as the main driver of humans in society. Continue reading →

Policy-makers often mention housing, transport and energy as key sectors to foster employment growth. Are their expectations justified? How will differences between European countries in terms of family values and ways of life influence the work opportunities available in the care sector? What are green jobs, and how do they come about? How do companies and organisations cope with the skill challenges of elderly workers? How has skills demand changed and what trends can we determine for the future?

These are some of the questions NEUJOBS researcher will try to answer in the final conference of the project on 1-2 December 2014, after 4 years of research and the publication of 2 books and more than 100 papers. The latter cover a variety of research fields, ranging from ‘Energy and green jobs’ over ‘Policy puzzles with Roma employment’ to ‘Work life balance and welfare transformation’.

The conference is fully booked: check out the programme and follow the debates during your favourite sessions on Twitter: #NEUJOBS

Jim Been and Olaf van Vliet (Leiden University) analyze the variation in early retirement across 13 European countries. The results of this study show that for men, part-time employment reduces early labor market withdrawal.

Although the participation rates of older workers have been rising for both men and women in many European countries, the participation rates are still low compared to those of prime-age workers. One prominent explanation for the low participation rates of older people is that once older people are unemployed or receive disability benefits, relatively few of them start working again before they reach the statutory retirement age. As a result, such social insurance programs function in practice quite often as an arrangement to smoothen the transition from work to retirement. Continue reading →

The NEUJOBS dissemination team has now made available the work product of the London event on “Ageing Society in Europe and UK” (15 September 2014), which can be downloaded from the NEUJOBS (FP7) and OSE websites. Available documents include:

The NEUJOBS dissemination team launched the NEUJOBS book “Let’s get to Work! The Future of Labour in Europe” (8 September 2014). We have made available the different outputs of this event, which can be downloaded from the NEUJOBS (FP7) and OSE websites:

- The book can be downloaded for free from the CEPS website
- A video, with short interviews and impression of the event;
- The PowerPoint presentation by Miroslav Beblavy (CEPS): key messages from the book
- Discussant’s notes, presented by Günther Schmid (WZB);
- The Labour Market Report of the EU’s Employment Committee, which was referred to by Tom Bevers;
- Tweets on #NEUJOBS

In the 20th century, prognostics for global economic progress were good; Kuznets theory (and curve) posited that income inequality would automatically decrease in advanced phases of capitalist development, and Robert Solow’s 1956 analysis of the conditions to achieve a “balanced growth path” proposed a growth trajectory along which output, incomes, profits, wages, capital and asset prices would progress at the same pace. This meant that every social group would benefit from growth to the same degree, with no major deviations from the norm. But since the 1970s, statistics have started to reveal how income inequality has increased significantly in the rich countries, especially the United States. Continue reading →

The NEUJOBS FP7 dissemination partners are happy to invite you to the launch of the book ‘Let’s get to Work! The Future of Labour in Europe’, which will take place on Monday 8th September 2014 at CEPS in Brussels.

Keynote speakers Miroslav Beblavy (CEPS), Günther Schmid (WZB Berlin) and Tom Bevers (Employment Committee) will address the most striking research findings that were brought together in the context of the NEUJOBS FP7 project. The panel, facilitated by Terry Martin (journalist & communications advisor), will engage in a discussion with the audience about the implications of the findings for the future of labour in Europe. Continue reading →

This conference aims to bring together researchers, practitioners, and policy makers to discuss the consequences of ageing on employment, labour demand and supply, skills, working conditions and gender issues. It is an opportunity for European scholars and national stakeholders to meet and debate key strategies for dealing with ageing. Leading researchers from the NEUJOBS project will present their understanding of present and future challenges to European labour markets. Continue reading →

From today, on NEUJOBS website, you can read the latest policy brief by Iain Begg. A short interesting piece of research where findings from different domains and the results of an intense discussion with high-level policy makers come together.

Here an extract: “It is a statement of the obvious that decarbonising the EU economy will take time and will require substantial investment. However, it is clear that Europe needs higher investment, notably from the macroeconomic perspective of boosting demand, and that there will be benefits not just from rendering the economy more sustainable but also in creating economic activity and jobs. Part of the necessary investment will, as several contributors to the workshop emphasised, have to be in skills and human capital. Nevertheless, various indirect effects have to be taken into account, such as the impact on public revenues as (heavily-taxed) fossil fuels decline to be replaced by other energy sources, especially if the latter attract subsidies.

It can be easy to postpone necessary energy transformations, especially if short-term considerations dominate policy thinking. An energy transition will, unavoidably, be disruptive; but the aim should be for it to be creatively destructive (in the Schumpeterian sense of fostering innovation), rather than just negatively so. In this regard, green jobs are alluring for politicians. They offer the prospect of a narrative for energy policy that comes over as positive and caring.”

Nearly halfway through the Europe 2020 Strategy, an analysis of the strategies pursued and results obtained thus far is presented by the European Trade Union Institute (ETUI) in the 2014 edition of the ‘Benchmarking Working Europe‘ report. The publication raises important questions such as: is the EU still suffering the consequences of the economic crisis triggered by financial crisis, or have the post-2010 austerity measures been effective in repairing the damage? If the latter is the case, how should policies be reoriented?

In 2009, after the beginning of the crisis, the EU showed some recovery through public spending intended to counter the falling activity from the private sector. After 2010, however, the EU GDP significantly diverged from the USA and the rest of the world, falling back into depression. At this point, the EU swapped its liberal spending policies for new austerity policies: a number of Member States, unable to sell bonds, became dependent on the IMF, the EU and the ECB (Troika), who imposed deficit reduction conditions (dubbed ‘internal devaluation’).